Adam's History sale on April 15th in the St Stephen's Green, Dublin saleroom includes an 18ct gold medal awarded to "the last Irishman to win Wimbledon". The pre-auction estimate is €15,000-€20,000.
The medal was won by Harold Segerson Mahony, who was crowned Lawn Tennis Champion at the All-England Club in 1896. Mahony was born into an Irish family in Edinburgh in 1867, the son of Richard John Mahony, a wealthy barrister.
He learned to play the game at the family's Irish home, Dromore Castle, Co Kerry, where his father had built a tennis court. He studied at Trinity College Dublin, moved to London and by the mid-1890s he was a regular on the tennis circuit there. Mahony won Wimbledon in 1896, defeating the previous year's winner, Wilfred Baddeley, in a five -set final. He died, aged only 38, after a cycling accident in Co Kerry.
